Drops of Crimson, Tongues of Scarlet
by lightmylumiere
Summary: The phantom tried so hard to resist going after the one who murdered his Christine, but sometimes the hardest things come with the best rewards. Drabble, one-shot. An aftermath story.


*After writing Aftermath, which covered Gustave's emotions years after the tragedy, I really felt that the phantom seemed to be a changed man. So I'll write on it.*

Drops of Crimson, Tongues of Scarlet

He watched as the blood poured onto the purple taffeta gown, his own hands stained with the crimson. Christine, his Christine: shot down, wounded, dying. The murderess sobbing uncontrollably, having shot her close friend. Madame Giry had dragged her barely sane daughter away from the pier nicknamed "suicide hall" to go find a doctor. And the boy- his boy, the poor ten year old boy! He went looking for the Vicomte, the man who raised him, and learned that his real father wasn't what he expected. An aberration, a masked millionaire, the ugly monster from his nightmare.

None of that would have happened if Meg could've been tamed or if she hadn't wanted an audience for her dramatic death plunge into the Atlantic. But she did, and she got what she wanted. A livid man, a terrified boy, a lethal gunshot, and a concerned mother to try to talk her out of it.

Mere moments after Christine's life slipped through his fingers, he sat beside Gustave on the pier. Madame Giry had come back with Raoul, and a doctor. But no Meg. The masked man rushed to Madame Giry in a rage, and the boy followed. "Where the devil is the wretch you call your daughter?" He roared, the woman looking up at him with red-rimmed eyes. She approached him, much against his will, and tried to give him a sympathetic hug.

"I'm so so sorry" She sniffled as he pushed her away. "the sweet fool didn't know what she was doing..."

"Bring her to me! I'll wring her neck for what she did!" Gustave watched as the man he found out was his biological father mere moments before, hoping he'd turn around and the anger would subside. He turned around just briefly enough to see the boy with tears in his eyes, standing beside the corpse of his Christine cradled in the Vicomte's arms.

"Mister Y, please" Gustave insisted, holding back tears as the man turned and stared at him. "please stay here... with me." Gustave didn't realize how easily those very words rolled off his tongue, but he did like how it sounded. Raoul looked up at the boy, his son, with nothing but surprise. The masked phantom came to the boy and wrapped him in a tight hug, both letting out identical sobs for the woman in their lives.

...

Gustave sat impatiently beside the man in a white mask on the piano bench, the ivory keys staring him down. "I won't play." Gustave stated stubbornly, not looking up at the man. "I refuse."

The man had never seen a child so stubborn. "You'll never get better if you don't practice."

"Mother told me that her angel of music would teach me to master my music, not that my father would." Father, a word no one had ever called him. He was just getting used to- two months after the tragedy- having a son.

"Well I was your mother's angel of music, and practice makes perfect." The phantom insisted, patting the boy on the head with a reassuring smile on his face.

"I haven't played since mother died, it reminds me of her." Gustave whined, hitting a soft spot in the phantom's seemingly cold heart. He put his hand on a blank staff, and ripped in out handing it to the sad boy. "What's this for?"

"Write a song for her." He suggested, a gruff tone arising in his voice. "If you can compose little songs in your head, just write one out."

Gustave eyed the man in the ivory mask, who had a small stack of loose scribbled-over sheet music in his hands. "You wrote those?"

"Every single one." He admitted, seeing the boy's eyes light up. "In hopes that one day your mother would sing them."

"You loved her didn't you?" The curious child asked, timid and sweet. Just as melodic as Christine's ever was, with the same intense desire of knowledge as his own. The man nodded, but pursed his lip. "That's why you fired Madame Giry from Phantasma, and why you wrote all those scores, isn't she?"

"Your mother was my muse." The phantom explained, smiling at the boy. "I hoped she'd sing for me just once more... I didn't realize that because of her" He resisted the urge to use the first word that came to mind. "friend would make sure I was the last person she ever sang for." Tears welled in his eyes as the boy watched him. The smile fell off his face and shattered.

"What else didn't I know about my mother?" Gustave asked after a long period of awkward silence. "I've learned about her angel, and her composer. And her best friend."

"I will tell it all to you tomorrow, Gustave, but for now I'd like you to perfect your art" He demanded through gritted teeth, not sounding as brusque as he imagined. "while I go handle some business."

"You won't be going after Miss Giry again, will you father?" Gustave begged, the pleading evident in his eyes. "Please don't, I don't want you to hurt her."

"She killed your mother, and she will pay Gustave. Soon or later." The phantom swirled his cape about as he spun back to the boy.

"Let someone else make her pay!" Gustave cried out, his fists banging onto the keys. "I don't want to grow up without either of my parents!" The phantom turned around and stared at the tantrum-throwing child. "Please please please please PLEASE!"

"I'm not letting her get away with what she did." The phantom roared, throwing his hands to the sky. Gustave looked at him with sadness in his eyes. "But I will stay and help you with your piece, if you desire." He said reluctantly, the boy giving him a slight grin.

...

The fifteen year old Gustave, being hounded by paparazzi as his piano career in the remainder of the Phantasma park took off. He had grown so much in the five years he had known his son. Five years exactly, since the love of his life had been shot. The tragedy, they called it.

He remembered that two years prior to this very day, he started to burn the concert hall. Bigger than the Met, wasn't it? It had been reconstructed for his son now, it was smaller and less lavish. Painted in shades of red and black, small portions of gold where Gustave thought it belonged. And over the black baby grand piano hung the painting of Christine he used to have hidden in his room.

"Gustave, please prepare your music and warm up if you will." The phantom directed, a certain sweet tone erupting to his voice. Gustave pulled a bunch of music out of his satchel, and set them out on the music stand.

"Father, will you play with me tonight?" Gustave asked, an immature sound in his deepening voice. "I've never really played for a crowd in this concert house, and the last time I played in one of your concert halls you burnt the place to the ground."

The phantom gulped and looked at the boy. "Miss Giry had come to see how you had handled the tragedy." He explained, putting his hand on his mask. "She can't bother us anymore."

"Please don't burn anything up again, father." Gustave pleaded. Their eyes met as he sat by his son, brown to brown. The only difference in the two's eyes was what swam in them. In the masked man's eyes were evidence of previous torture and lurking envy. Gustave's eyes were filled with the light of Christine.

Everything came flooding back to him. The drops of crimson, the ink stains on the paper when he couldn't find the right notes, the tongues of scarlet that engulfed his beloved concert house and the chorus girl he murdered inside, the chocolate eyes that matched her hair. It all led him back to Christine, and then to the boy. "I would never do anything to risk hurting you, my boy." He replied patting him on the head.

He couldn't lose all that was dear to him again.

*I hope that was okay... Review please?*


End file.
